Sometimes you see a liberal-leftist lie so big and ridiculous that you just simply laugh. In fact, you chuckle to yourself and recall the viral email explaining the Grand Canyon of difference between liberal-statists and those that cherish liberty. What's it called, I want a divorce? Something like that.

Today's USA Today 'article' is one of the most pathetic example of pathetically pretensed pieces of propaganda garbage that I have ever seen.

Straight from those that think you should be kissing their ring for your mere existence, guess what America? You are paying the lowest level of taxes since the 1950s!

Amid complaints about high taxes and calls for a smaller government, Americans paid their lowest level of taxes last year since Harry Truman's presidency, a USA TODAY analysis of federal data found.

Some conservative political movements such as the "Tea Party" have criticized federal spending as being out of control. While spending is up, taxes have fallen to exceptionally low levels.

Federal, state and local taxes — including income, property, sales and other taxes — consumed 9.2% of all personal income in 2009, the lowest rate since 1950, the Bureau of Economic Analysis reports. That rate is far below the historic average of 12% for the last half-century. The overall tax burden hit bottom in December at 8.8.% of income before rising slightly in the first three months of 2010.

"The idea that taxes are high right now is pretty much nuts," says Michael Ettlinger, head of economic policy at the liberal Center for American Progress. The real problem is spending,counters Adam Brandon of FreedomWorks, which organizes Tea Party groups. "The money we borrow is going to be paid back through taxation in the future," he says.

This mental midgety is wrong on so many levels that I cannot even begin. Did they attain the 9.2% figure by simply dividing the entire U.S. population by tax revenue at local, state and federal levels? For crying out loud, my California income tax alone is 10% +.

Of course this propaganda designed as "news" doesn't tell us how they came to this absurd conclusion. We can only figure they simply took the amount of tax revenue taken in by federal, state and local governments and divided it by the total population. Seriously, how on earth they can possibly tell me I'm paying 9.2% of my income when I have eyes and can actually read my paycheck and tax return?

Seems to me some of our "friends" on the left are behind this drivel and are just using this as a pretense to jack up our taxes under the mantra we're not paying our fair share or some such nonsense.

8 comments:

Well, they likely majored in communications; not in math and since they're working for a newspaper still (especially the USA Today) they weren't at the top of the pile intelligence wise. A few letters short of a full alphabet and wot wot.

That they can even add numbers is surprising enough; that those numbers are so full of slant they're printed in a circle is hardly worthwhile to mention.

Well, I know nothing about their facts or methodology, but it is possible that their figures are roughly accurate. After all, if roughly 50% of the population pays no taxes at all, that means the remaining 50% is paying 18.4% on average. Add in all the people using kickbacks, loopholes, tax avoidance schemes, and offshore accounts to shield large potions of their wealth from Uncle Sam's redistribution programs, and you could easily see how the honest working middle class can be paying 30% or more. Add in some creative manipulation (eg: counting the $800B in stimulus funds as income for the population in 2009, after all it was allocated then and the kickbacks and payoffs had to go somewhere), and you could probably even approach the real levels of taxation for the people footing the bill for this country (ie: typically 40% or more, depending on your state). At least, that is, before you figure out how to pay for the $1,500B extra the country spent in 2009 beyond it's actual tax income...

The real problem isn't just the spending, although that is a huge problem which is adequately large enough to justify all the protestations of the Tea Party and more. The "real problem" is also the movement toward wealth redistribution, massive deficit expansion, kickbacks and special favors, increased corruption, and overall disgusting behavior of our government. When we have a flat tax, where everybody pays the same percentage of all their income from all sources, then we can start comparing the taxation level historically, with some semblance of relevance to the burden on the people not on the take. Until then, USA Today, how about you go back to babbling incoherently and leave the trying to rationalize and distort to the current administration: at least that way you both don't look like incompetent pandering imbeciles.

I wonder if they put in state sales taxes, which here in Sacramento is 9% alone. Add use tax for any cars, hidden taxes like tobacco, gasoline (14 cents just at the federal level per gallon) and alcohol, and it adds up quick because even those that aren't paying any income taxes are definately paying those. I'll wager those that aren't paying "any taxes" are actually paying 10% but just don't know it and that's a conservative guess which blow this nonsense out of the water. What next, men who work 39% more hours are making 28% more money than women who work less? Oh wait, NOW does promote that. Oh, how about the rich predominately votes Republican. Oh, nope, it's 2 to 1 Democrats (idiots!). Oh wait, most terrorists are white conservates (according to the BO administration). What, it's mainly arhab muslim males? Well, darn, is there one statistic that the liberal left gives that isn't misleading or a lie? How about 90% of all statistics are wrong?

Actually, that's only applicable to income taxes. Almost every adult pays a multitude of other taxes (some of which are poorly disguised as "fees").

Example: Why are gas prices so high? Taxes and government-imposed fees. Oil companies make a small margin, far smaller than how much is taken by the government. If you buy gas (and almost every American adult does), you pay a significant chunk of your income to the government.

Then we've got that @$%#! Socialist Security tax, which if you are self-employed is over 15% of your income. Even if you're not self-employed and only have about 7.5% withheld, your employer is required to pay the other 7.5% to the government instead of giving it to you. That portion payed by the company is essentially part of your salary that you never see, and must be included for a real calculation of how much we are taxed.

Those are just two of many examples. There is a long list of other taxes and "fees" that are confiscated every time we move, breathe, or think.

Every normal adult in the U.S. pays far, far too much in taxes, even if they don't pay any income tax.

"When compiling sharp conservative thoughts and takes for my Morning Jolt newsletter late at night and early in the morning, I find myself coming back to Left Coast Rebel again and again." -Jim Geraghty, National Review"Hey Tim, I appreciate the kind email and the plug on your site. It’s rare that my first feedback isn’t hate mail from a disgruntled statist! You carry on too – we’ve got our work cut out for us." -Tad DeHaven, Cato Institute"Thanks so much for all YOU do for liberty and individual rights. I appreciate your strong voice for capitalism. We're changing the culture -- keep it up!" -Jonathan Hoenig, Fox News"Congrats Tim. You have arrived." -GatewayPundit"Before we sell California to China or go Lex Luther on the San Andreas Fault, let's be sure to save the Left Coast Rebel." -Barack Obama's Cousin, Milton R. Wolf, M.D.

"I like LCR because it seems like more thought goes into posts there than at many other blogs that focus more on horse-race politics." -Nate Nelson, United Liberty

Legal Ease

This weblog is licensed under a Creative Commons License.
The opinions expressed are those of the respected authors alone. Any material posted here is made available for educational and informative purposes, and as such constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Title 17 U.S.C., section 107 of the US Copyright Law. The material on this blog is provided without profit for benign research and educational purposes.